Ghosts in Darkness Released to Playtesters

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Ghosts in Darkness, the intro scenario from Machinations, has finally gone out to playtesters!

And to celebrate, I give you The Chickenhawk! This comes with an announcement that Ryan Wolfe of 0hr Art and Technology (http://0-hr.com/) will be lending his talents to Machinations and future Nova Praxis products.

Those familiar with Ryan's Future Armada line might recognize The Chickenhawk as an Exeter class vessel. I highly recommend checking this, and his other great designs, out on his website.

Chickenhawk Deck.jpg
Chickenhawk Render.jpg

Progress Behind the Curtain

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Finally got the first draft of Ghosts in Darkness complete. It's the introductory scenario that will be in Machinations, the Nova Praxis GM guide.

It took longer than I'd hoped because I've been running a playtest as I've been writing it, and scheduling conflicts have made getting play time in rather difficult of late.

I've got a few little tweaks to make, and a few NPCs to stat up, and then it will be ready to release to playtesters.

I've also been in the process of pulling a lot of other strings together for future projects. I can't talk much about those yet, but expect to hear at least two big announcements by the end of the year. 

 

Nova Praxis Print Sale

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For a limited time, you can get Nova Praxis in print at a reduced price! 

Nova Praxis [Hardcover]
$29.99 $44.99

This is the hardcover printed copy of Nova Praxis.

272 pages + Poster Map

Available now!

Learn more about Nova Praxis here. 

International Shipping: Why is it so expensive? See here.

Nova Praxis PDF and Website Store Updated

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Just a quick note. I have drastically reduced the file size for the version of the print version of the Nova Praxis PDF. You can get the update by re-downloading it from DrivethruRPG or wherever you got it.

We have also just added several new products to our web store. I believe you'll get a better discount ordering from us directly than anywhere else. 

And more are coming! 

Check it out, and if you see any problems, be sure to let us know. 

Void Star at GenCon

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First of all, Indie Press Revolution (IPR) will be selling Nova Praxis at their booth there. So if you want a print copy, and haven't gotten one yet, there you go.

Second... Looking over my schedule, it looks we're going to arrive at the con on Thursday around 3:00 or so. 

As of right now, I'm going to be free from 10:00-11:00AM, and then any time after 3:00PM, Friday and Saturday. I'm free most of the day Sunday, but we'll be leaving sometime around 3:00.

During the free time, I'm going to be looking for people to hang out and/or game with. It's just myself and my wife going. It's our first time at GenCon, and I'm not overbooked on events. So don't be shy! My main reason for going is to socialize with you guys, game, get feedback, talk future products, etc.

I'm going to create a Google+ circle for people who want to meet up and talk Nova Praxis, FATE, D&D, movies, sci-fi, the singularity, or whatever other chunks of assorted geekery you want to talk about.

And if a game breaks out, then that's great too.

Nova Praxis has gone Platinum!

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Almost exactly four months after its release, the Nova Praxis Augmented PDF has become a Platinum Best Seller on DrivethruRPG!

Thank you all very much!

I cannot express how cool it is to finally see Nova Praxis out there in the hands of the fans. And more,Nova Praxis Augmented PDF seems to have triggered a trend in the industry. Since its release, I've seen many more publishers adding additional functionality to their PDFs (many of them even calling them "Augmented PDFs" :D ).

And now all the orders for the print version have been shipped, and you can get the PDF of the print version on a "Pay What You Want" basis here. And don't forget that this version grants permission to share the PDF with friends and family. So please do!

If you want it in print, you can either order it from this site or ask your local game store to order it from Indie Press Revolution.

What's next?

GenCon is coming up and I hope to see you guys there. While Void Star Studios will not have it's own booth, Nova Praxis will be sold at GenCon by our distributor Indie Press Revolution. And I'll be there ready and willing to talk to sign books, hang out, and answer questions about Nova Praxis, Strands of Fate, or whatever else you want to talk about.

After that, we become laser focused on getting Machinations out the door. Formerly called "The GM Companion", Machinations will cover a lot of the stuff we just didn't have room for in the core book. It'll delve deeper into the Houses, introduce some new factions, provide an introductory scenario (Ghosts in Darkness), sample plot arcs, more advice on running Shadow War centered campaigns, advice for running different types of campaigns that diverge from the mission-based structure suggested in the core book, and more. We've already been putting some time in on it, and I'm super happy with how it's shaping up.

Many thanks to everyone who has supported us! 

 

Nova Praxis Now Available at IPR

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I am pleased to announce that Nova Praxis is now available, to both individuals and retailers, through Indie Press Revolution.

If you are a retailer who would like to carry Nova Praxis, please contact IPR at support@indiepressrevolution.com

If you are not a retailer, please take a moment to tell your local gamestore owner about Nova Praxis and direct them to IPR. They can also carry Strands of Fate and Strands of Power, but since they are only available via print on demand, they should contact us directly at info@voidstarstudios.com to discuss the details.

IPR will also be handling our convention sales. So if you want a copy of Nova Praxis at GenCon, be sure to stop by their booth! 

Nova Praxis Shipping Update

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We've been busy folks. The Kickstarters are going out first and are almost done. All of the domestic signed copies are out the door. The international ones go out tomorrow.

Those that Kickstarted, but got copies that weren't signed, start going out today. 

If our luck holds, all Kickstarter orders should be fulfilled by Wednesday. And all current website orders should be filled by Friday.

If you haven't got one yet, and you want one, you can order from our website here. Or you can ask your friendly local game shop to order some from Indie Press Revolution (IPR)!

 

Pay What You Want for Nova Praxis

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The PDF of the print version is now on sale on DrivethruRPG. And best of all, we're releasing it as a "pay what you want" title. And if you're like most people, that means "free!". 

This PDF is a raw PDF, and is in fact a slightly modified version of the PDF sent to the printer. It doesn't have any bookmarks, links, etc. But hey, it's free. :) If you want all that stuff, you need to check out the Augmented PDF.

The second bit of news is that the Augmented PDF has been updated. So make sure you go download the latest version. There is very little in the way of errata or content changes, but I fixed a few issues with the functionality of the PDF, made it a little faster, and improved the look and interface a bit.

 

Kickstarter Shipments

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Surveys to collect shipping addresses have gone out. Make sure you fill them out ASAP!

If you don't see it in your email, make sure you check your spam. If you still don't see it, make sure you backed a tier that offers a copy of the book in print. If you didn't get the survey, and you checked your spam, and you know you backed at a level that gets you a copy of the book, email customerservice@voidstarstudios.com

And just to be clear, the last question is asking for the number of additional books you ordered. So if you didn't add any extra funds to cover any extra copies of the book, just enter "0".

Thanks! We're hoping to be shipping by the end of next week, and Kickstarters who get their surveys filled out by Tuesday are first in line.

Thank you all!

Mike

Ripping off the Future

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[Preface: This was a post I put up a few weeks ago on Google+  in response to this YouTube video. I thought I'd toss it up here as well.]

GMT mentions that some people are saying that Nova Praxis is too similar to Eclipse Phase because it "rips off the singularity and transhuman ideas".

See, here's the thing. As is pointed out in the video below, Eclipse Phase didn't invent the concept of the Technological Singularity (ask John von Neumann who first talked about it in the 50's), nor the idea of transhumanity. In fact, Eclipse Phase very clearly "rips off" aspects of Altered Carbon, Revelation Space, and many others. And so did Nova Praxis. And Nova Praxis also goes on to "rip off" Mass Effect, Deus Ex, and other inspirational sources. That's how fiction works.

But the idea that anyone can "rip off" the concept of the singularity and transhumanism is laughable. These are not niche genre traits invented by a single author. They are cultural and technological movements. You can call it "transhuman sci-fi", but it's really just "sci-fi". It's the way things are going. It's the most reasonable and likely path for humanity's future currently proposed in fiction.

I've said it many times, and I'll say it again here. Though while they played a role, the primary sources of inspiration for Nova Praxis' setting weren't novels or video games or other RPGs, but the lectures and non-fiction books written by today's top futurists.

More specifically, the majority of Nova Praxis sprang from my reading of The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology by Ray Kurzweil, and trying to figure out how to take the ideas within and use them as the foundation for creating a fictional setting. But that setting had to be something you could relate to as a present day human, deal with the problems humanity will have to deal with during the transitional periods, and function as the basis for an RPG.

But, in the end, Nova Praxis and Eclipse Phase certainly have a few things in common. So let's talk about those:

1. Post-Singularity: From what I remember, EP handles this in a way that is much more Terminator, and deviates considerably from how most experts believe the singularity will occur. (And that's fine!) With NP, we tried to stick as close to what the experts are predicting as possible, and still make a workable game. As an extension of this, both settings feature areas that have achieved a (very close) post-scarcity economic state. And a reputation based economy is one of the more interesting proposals for how this can work.

2. Transhumanity: Again, this is an emerging trend in all sci-fi; and it's emerging for a reason. Or if that's not good enough, you could say Transhuman Space did it first and both EP and NP are "ripping it off". :)

3 The Loss of Earth: I can't speak for why the EP authors did it. But I can tell you why we did it for NP.

"Nova Praxis" roughly translates to "new way". I wanted to wipe the slate clean, strip humanity of (the majority) of its cultures and historical baggage, and present a believable scenario in which humanity would not only be forced to change, but be presented with an opportunity to do so in radical ways.

For a long time I'd planned to kill Earth with a meteor. Then nukes. And for a little while I toyed with the idea of going the Terminator/RP route of having an AI do it. But in the end, I wanted mankind to be the ones ultimately responsible.

Much like the dropping of the bombs on Japan, the release of the technophage was supposed to end the war in a single moment of sheer horror and destruction. And in that regard, it worked. But then it went on to become mankind's biggest mistake, and a constant reminder of what can happen when technological progress goes unchecked.

So there you go, my thoughts on the "NP ripped off EP" thing.

 

Open Testing of the Sequence Rules

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This is something I (very reluctantly) had to cut from the Nova Praxis​ core book. In my opinion it's as critical to the game as anything else in the book, but we had to do what we had to do.

Just click the link below, download the playtest doc, check it out, and tell us what you think!​ The completed Sequence rules will be in the upcoming "GM Companion".

[Sequence Rules Open Playtest]